Social Business Incubator Villgro Invests In 7 Startups

Chennai based social business incubator Villgro has disclosed its investment in 7 startups, taking the total number of startups it has invested in this year to 10.

It has invested about INR 10-15 lakh in each startup, which include: Kamal Kisab, Flybird Innovations, VectorDoc, SustainEarth, SkillTrain, MicroX Labs and Bempu.

All the startups have their prototype of the product ready. “Most funding will be used for finishing touches to product and take it to market,” said P R Ganapathy, chief operating officer, Villgro.

Since its launch in 2001, Villgro has incubated 103 such enterprises, generated around 4000 jobs, secured INR 873 Mn in follow-on funding, and touched over 6.8 million lives.

By end of this fiscal, Villgro plans to incubate and invest in about 25-30 startups. Of these, 11 startups are from The Arthur Venture Challenge platform, which have engaged Villgro to provide incubation support only and the balance is being funded solely by Villgro.

Villgro has developed a unique approach of working with entrepreneurs at multiple phases of their startup journey – including pre-product, pre-revenue and pre-scale – and offering a combination of mentoring, talent infusion and networks critical to startups working in various sectors.

Going forward, Villgro is also in final stages of launching a social impact fund with a corpus of INR 20 Cr. by March.

It now also has a commitment of Michael & Susan Dell Foundation, which has invested an undisclosed amount in the fund last month. The part of the funding from the Dell family Foundation will go towards Villgro’s social impact investment fund, which in turn will be focused on investing in companies in the education space.